8 | MARCH 16 • 2023
PURELY COMMENTARY
opinion
Ameinu Detroit’s Position on Israel’s Current Government
E
very Saturday night
for the past six weeks,
hundreds of thousands
of Israelis have taken to the
streets around the country
to protest the
Netanyahu
government’s
attempt to
destroy checks
and balances in
Israel’s political
system by
curtailing the
independence
of the judiciary and granting
ultimate authority to the
legislative branch.
These protesters come from
all strata of Israeli society
— they are religious and
secular, left wing and right,
Jews and Arabs. What unites
them is the recognition that
Israel’s democratic system is
at risk, and that the so-called
“judicial overhaul” is really
the first stop on the way to an
illiberal autocracy — a system
in which the majority of
Israelis do not wish to live.
Prime Minister Netanyahu,
who is facing corruption
charges, has established
the most right-wing, anti-
democratic government in
Israel’s history.
After dragging Israelis
to the polls five times over
a four-year span, one of
Netanyahu’s policy goals may
be to avoid prosecution. He
has shown he will stop at
nothing.
Ministers in his latest
government include
Kahanists, racists, Jewish
supremacists and anti-
LGBQ rabbis. When this
current government was
formed at the end of 2022,
it quickly became apparent
that its new ministers would
likely not be committed to
the preservation of Israel’s
imperfect and fragile
democracy.
There are those who say the
current government is merely
a reflection of the democratic
will of the citizens of Israel
and that free elections have
consequences to which all
must abide, winners and
losers alike.
To claim, however,
that this government is
representative of the majority
of Israeli voters is simply
untrue. Between them, the
six parties that comprise
this government received
fewer than 50% of the votes
of the Israeli electorate in
the election that was held
in November 2022. The
election essentially ended
in a tie, with a mere 30,000
votes separating the ruling
coalition and the opposition.
Moreover, Meretz and
Balad, two long-standing
political parties, both
failed to cross the electoral
threshold and did not receive
any seats in the current
Knesset, leaving their
combined 300,000 voters
disenfranchised.
TAKING A PUBLIC
POSITION
There are voices saying that
it’s not the place of Jews
who live in the diaspora to
take public positions against
Israel’s government. They
believe that our role should
be one of cheerleader and
fundraiser, leaving dissent
for the people who live in the
country who are solely able
to speak on domestic Israeli
issues. For decades, Jews
around the world abided by
this unwritten rule and, for
the most part, saved their
criticisms for private discus-
sion.
But the risk Israel faces
today has upended that
equation, and we are
beginning to hear voices from
places we’re not used to. Abe
Foxman, the former head of
the ADL and one of Israel’s
staunchest defenders in the
United States, has warned
that “if Israel ceases to be an
open democracy, I won’t be
able to support it.”
Around the country,
rabbis and other communal
leaders have also begun to
speak out from their pulpits
and their organizations. In
recent weeks, Israeli expats
around the globe have begun
protesting in solidarity with
their relatives and friends
back home. A group called
UnXeptable has organized
protests in Washington,
D.C., New York, Los Angeles,
Silicon Valley, Toronto and
other North American
cities.
So, what should North
American Jews do?
We should take our
cues not from the legacy
organizations that tell us to
keep quiet and mind our
own business, but from our
brothers and sisters in Israel
and from Israelis living
abroad who are marching in
the streets, protesting and
striking, refusing to remain
silent.
Bradley Burston, one
of Israel’s most respected
journalists, has a message for
North American Jews: “Bibi
is betting everything he’s got
that in the end, the Jewish
world will let him get away
with turning Israel into a
slave state. A state which will
permanently and irrevocably
deny millions of Palestinians
the most basic of human
rights. A state empowered
to intrude into and oppress
and control and embitter
with impunity the lives of all
women, all LGBTQ people,
all non-Jewish Israelis, all
non-Bibi-voting Israelis, all
asylum seekers, Reform and
Conservative.”
He added that this could
be end of Israel as we know
it. “The end of pluralism and
tolerance in Judaism. The
intentional end of the concept
of tikkun olam.”
He pleads for people to
support a democratic Israel
by joining the protests. “Not
just for the sake of Israel,” he
writes, “for your own. For
the sake of your family and
the future. Think with your
heart. Stand up. Make noise.
Draw a line. It is literally now
or never.”
The stakes couldn’t be
higher. In 2023, showing
your support for Israel means
standing in solidarity with
the hundreds of thousands
of Israelis who are on the
front lines of Israel’s fight to
preserve its democracy.
Mark Phillips is treasurer of Ameinu
Detroit, on whose behalf he is writing.
He lived on Kibbutz Adamit for 17
years and is an Israeli citizen.
Mark
Phillips
Ameinu
Detroit